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CHAOS 




'At intervals strange shapes 
in myriads." 



CHAOS 

A VISION OF ETERNITY 

BY 

ALTAIR 

ILLUSTRATED BY 

VICTOR PERARD 

From designs by the author 



'It is an open secret to the few who know it 
but a mystery and a stumbling block to the 
many that Science and Poetry are own sisters. 

Sir Frederick Pollock 



NEW YORK 

DOUGLAS C. McMURTRIE 

1919 



Copyright, iqiq Douglas C. McMurtrie 
All Rights Reserved 



^^0 






m -7 \m 



'CLA53518 






DEDICATED TO THOSE 
^'WHO THEMSELVES IN SOME 
MEASURE ALSO SEE VISIONS 
AND DREAM DREAMS.'' 

RUSKIN 



CONTENTS Vll 



Page 

Preface ix 

Introduction xi 

Prologue in two scenes: 

Scene 7. Birth of the Universe i 

Scene II. The Eternal Question 6 

The Vision of Eternity : 

I. To-day lo 

II. To-morrow 20 

III. The End of Man 28 

IV. Disintegration 37 

V. The Skeptic in Chaos 45. 

Index 53 



Vlll ILLUSTRATIONS 



Opposite Page 

1. At intervals strange shapes in myriads . . Frontispiece 

2. The western hank of Hudson' s mighty stream . . lo 

3. The steel-framed structures that once pierced the 

sky 28 

4. Great bridges that once spanned the river's tide . 30 

5. A library far-famed in all the land 32 

6. The crumbling world is vitrified and bare .... 37 

7. Art thou the famed Aurora of the classic age? . . 40 

8. A peace-dispensing radiance filled the scene ... 45 



PREFACE IX 



PREFACE 

Should any optimist feel disposed to object to the 
doleful picture of man's character, life and destiny de- 
picted in this drama, let it be remembered that it is — 
all a dream. Yet, dreams come true! Since this work was 
written a great war has devastated Europe and embroiled 
the entire world. In the midst of universal culture, when 
mankind was serenely contemplating an age of peace and 
enlightened development, the great storm broke. The 
barbarities of primitive ages were duplicated, and, even 
surpassed. Rapine and torture ; the taking and killing of 
hostages ; the bombardment and destruction of unfortified 
places and the ruthless murder of non-combatants — all of 
these brutalities were unexpectedly revived ; to the horror 
and amazement of a startled world. 

In the wake of all this came other ills hardly less dis- 
creditable to human nature: While the true men of the 
world were fighting the battles of civilization, other men, 
debased and sordid, preaching patriotism in the meantime 
at a safe distance from the zone of danger, were insidiously 
profiteering in all the necessities of life ; turning the sacri- 
fice of their brothers-in-arms to their own selfish advantage. 
And now, with the war over, the evil still continues. Even 
religious intolerance, suspended for a time, has reawakened 
and, while its blinded votaries are struggling for tactical 



PREFACE 



advantage, Paganism runs rampant with poisonous fangs 
aimed at the heart of all religion. Races, too, are stirred 
again to selfish rivalries. Imperialism, for the destruction 
of which the war was fought, still lurks in unexpected places 
and diplomats are still striving to solve international prob- 
lems by the methods of Machiavelli. In short, we are 
wearing the habiliments of civilization; but our culture is 
largely cold formula. We speak the phrases of the Twenti- 
eth Century; but cherish in our hearts the fears, the hates, 
and the passions of Medievalism. 

Sooner or later, it will be realized that there exists in 
the universe a law of retributive justice, akin to, and as 
inexorable as, the law of compensation. For thousands of 
years mankind has been fluctuating between the extremes 
of individual selfishness and race selfishness. It is only a 
short step from Emerson's philosophy of Self-Reliance to 
the arrogant Superman theory of Nietzsche. The indi- 
vidual must be taught that what is best for the community 
is best for himself; and races must learn that what is best 
for mankind is best for every race in common. In this 
lies the hope of the world. 



INTRODUCTION XI 



INTRODUCTION 

J\ FEW words as to the form in which this work is pre- 
sented, would seem to be appropriate. Though in the 
nature of an epic in conception and scope, its movement 
is inherently dramatic. Its theme is the creation, the 
culmination and disintegration of the material universe. 
The primitive simplicity of the plot and the vastness of 
its range seemed to call for a revival of the simpler methods 
of the ancient Greek drama. For this reason, the chorus 
has been introduced as it existed prior to the time of 
iEschylus. Thus the skeptic narrates his experience and 
the chorus makes appropriate observations from time to 
time expressive of the feelings which the stage pictures 
presented might arouse in an intelligent audience. 

According to Eschenburg, "the chorus is charged with 
the exposition of the fable" (plot), "it praised the Gods 
and justified them against the complaints of the suffering 
and unhappy; it sought to soothe the excited passions 
and to impart lessons of wisdom and experience, and in 
general to suggest useful practical reflections." The chorus 
is a convenient medium by which to express the author's 
opinions. As Professor Gilbert Murray says, in the intro- 
duction to his translation of Euripides (p. Iviii, Vol. Ill, 
The Athenian Drama), the chorus "is a method wonder- 
fully contrived for expressing those vaguer faiths and 



XU CHAOS 



aspirations which a man feels haunting him, and calling 
to him, but which he cannot state in plain language or 
uphold with a full acceptance of responsibility/^ 

In the performance of a modern drama, in which so 
much depends upon the scenery and action, there is no 
need for a chorus; but in the following poem it will be 
obvious that the expedient of resorting to the chorus is 
required by the nature of the drama and of the observa- 
tions which could not properly come from its sole actor. 
Under the law of the Grecian drama, the chorus was not 
permitted to leave the orchestra throughout the course of 
the drama. This called forth the following caustic com- 
ment from Sir Walter Scott, in his essay on the Drama: 
"when a deed of violence was to be acted, the helpless 
chorus, instead of interfering to prevent the atrocity, to 
which the perpetrator had made them privy, could only, 
by the rules of the theater, exhaust their sorrow and sur- 
prise in dithyrambics." 

Scott was not the first to find fault with the chorus. 
Aristophanes puts into the mouth of Euripides the follow- 
ing comment upon the chorus of -^schylus and Phrynichus: 

. . . "And on the chorus spluttered 
Through long song-systems, four on end, 
the actors mute as fishes." 

The chorus was retained in the early English drama; 
but was used chiefly for the declamation of the Prologue 
or Epilogue. In Milton's Samson AgonisteSj the chorus 
participates in the dialogue. It announces the entrance 



INTRODUCTION XIU 

of the actors and fulfils all of the functions of the early 
Greek drama. 

In answer to the possible objection that the want of 
action might militate against the use of the dramatic form 
in the following poem, it may be observed that the Per- 
sians of iEschylus is practically a narrative. Attossa 
asks for news of Xerxes. The messenger complies, de- 
scribing the Battle of Salamis. The chorus intervenes with 
running comment. The ghost of Darius is introduced; 
pats himself on the back, and condemns Xerxes. The 
latter enters and bemoans his fate. The chorus concludes 
with Strophe and Anti-Strophe and the drama closes with 
a procession in which actors and chorus march out wailing 
and rending their robes. Not a change in scene; not a 
single action. 



PROLOGUE 



PROLOGUE 

SCENE I 
BIRTH OF THE UNIVERSE 

Utter Darkness 

CHORUS 

Now Chaos comes, who rules the potent realms, 
Where Night and Death eternal vigil keep. 
From out his bosom all that lives shall spring; 
Into his bosom all that dies shall sink. 
In yonder depths, long, long before Time was. 
The primal elements all dormant lay — 
Profoundly resting in pre-natal sleep. 
Throughout the formless cavernous abyss,^ 
The infinite bounds were silent, dark, and still ; 

{Distant rumbling is heard) 
Now hark ! a murmur echoes from afar, 
A stir of life pervades the stagnant void. 
Anon a movement starts within the deep, 
And rolling thunder rises from the depths — 
The Elements in violent birth awake ; ^ 
Lights flash and joyous sounds reverberate. 

Partial Illumination 
{Disclosing three castles above the clouds. Lower stage still dark) 

^ See note on Nebular Hypothesis, p. 17. 

2 Referring to the chemical elements (eighty in number) out of 
which all forms of matter are constituted. 



CHAOS 



Centre. Castle of Hydrogen 
Right. Castle of Oxygen 
Left. Castle of Nitrogen 

Gates of the Castle of Oxygen open and two sturdy 
youths with wings appear dressed in armor. 

One flies toward the Castle of Hydrogen. Throws a 
spear against the gates which fly open and two beautiful 
girls with wings flutter out. 

The other throws a spear against the gates of Nitrogen 
Castle, which open also, and there appears a young girl 
with wings, dressed in white, flying slowly. 

{Full illumination) 

Enter, in wild confusion. Elements represented by young 
men and women with shouts of joy. 

{Music appropriate) 
Execute dance in pantomime. 

CHORUS 

Behold the birth of Love and Hate, 

As ancient sages taught,^ 
While some repel, 'tis others' fate 

To be by Cupid caught. 

3 Empedocles and the Greek School of Philosophers which fol- 
lowed his guidance, taught that the elements of nature were 
brought into combination and separated from each other by the 
powers of Love and Hate, and that from the influence of these 
forces all things were created. 



PROLOGUE 



A vagrant beau called Oxygen,'* 

Impulsive strong and gay, 
Assails the Court of Hydrogen; ^ 

But soon is brought to bay. 

He's smitten by its daughters fair 

And two he takes to wife — 
The fiery damsels of the void 

Whose destiny is strife. 

Mid din and crash and rumbling roar 

And flashing, flickering lights, 
And laughter from the Titan host 

And countless scores of sprites — 

4 Oxygen, named by Lavoisier, first separated and identified by 
Dr. Priestley. The chief constituent of water, in the formation of 
which, in combination with Hydrogen, it is approximately eight- 
ninths by weight. In combination with Nitrogen, in the ratio of 
one to five, it forms the air. It is the great supporter of combustion 
and animal life. It is the most versatile of the elements, and is 
not only the basic element of air and water but enters largely into 
the formation of all solid substances, even being approximately 
one-half by weight of the rocks composing the earth's sub- 
stance. 

^ Hydrogen is the lightest of the elements and, perhaps, the 
most inflammable. Upon its discovery by Cavendish, he called 
it "inflammable air." The spectroscope reveals its presence in the 
Sun. It is one of the paradoxes of nature that this light inflam- 
mable gaseous element upon being chemically combined with 
Oxygen should form water, the eternal foe of fire. 



CHAOS 



Amidst the roar of Elements, 

The nuptials are a lark; 
They honeymoon in a crystal sphere 

Afloat on a crystal barque. 

(Loud explosion and sound of rushing waters. From 
the center of the group of Elements appears a large crystal 
globe in which the groom and his two mates stand with 
hands joined.) 

A brother of the sturdy groom 

Pays court to a damsel rare. 
Dame Nitrogen is fair but cold ; ^ 

Their union forms the air. 

Then other Elements unite 

According to affinity ; 
The partners join and dance in glee, 

And so on to infinity. 

6 Nitrogen forms nearly eighty per cent, by volume, and 
seventy-seven per cent, by weight of the atmosphere. Nitrogen 
and Oxygen have only the feeblest attraction for each other. 
Their mixture to form the air is not a chemxical combination. The 
chief attribute of Nitrogen is to deprive all the elements, with 
which it combines, of the power of combining with Oxygen — that 
is, of undergoing combustion. It may be said, therefore, to be a 
damper upon affection or affinity. Yet it is indispensable to 
vegetation. Without it the world would be barren. 



PROLOGUE 



In spirals, circles, in and out, 

From chaos order settles, 
To outer realms the lighter jfloat 

Now in the centre, metalsJ 

And thus are formed the stars and suns 

And satellites attending, 
Which now bedeck the universe. 

Illumination lending. 

Scene darkens. Discloses the sky at night v/ith stars and 
planets brightly shining. Meteors and comets flash 
across the sky. Mists and clouds — The sun rises. 

CHORUS 

Hail ! mighty Sun ! to earth the King of Kings, 
Of all the suns the firmament upholds! 
About thy throne thy satellites attend, 
In solemn grandeur since their fiery birth 
Long years ago when all was nebulous. 
Thy potent rays have stirred the Elements 
To huge and infinite reactions and 
To Titan conflicts through long Geologic days. 
Thy forces set the earth and air apart 
And made the waters take their wonted course ; 
With verdure clad the inhospitable mass; 
Prepared the globe for divers forms of life. 

^ See note on Nebular Hypothesis, p. 17. 



CHAOS 



Thou wert beholder of the birth of man 
And mothered then his infant helplessness. 
To thee in gratitude he raised his head 
In prayer, and decked his altars with thy fire.^ 
Thou hast beheld the world from chaos rise 
And into chaos wilt thou see it fall. 

SCENE II 

THE ETERNAL QUESTION 

A balcony overlooking the Hudson River. The Palisades 
in the distance. 

SKEPTIC 

You ask me how I know that death's the end 
And that 'Hereafter' is an idle myth — 
Because I've had the experience of sleep, 
Which is the living prototype of death. 
For if we gain release from pain and woe 
By grateful slumber's dead unconsciousness. 
Why not the more should death's eternal sleep 
Give final surcease to our mortal toil ; 
Extinguish mind, aye, soul — if such there be — 
Annihilate the future with the past? 

8 Primitive man in all ages has had a singular respect for the 
sun as the source of heat and light. The worship of the sun as a 
deity was common and temples were erected in his honor. The 
stone ruins at Stonehenge are now believed to have marked a 
temple to the sun erected about 1680 b. c. 



PROLOGUE 



FRIEND 

Aye, you have slept, but have you never dreamt? 
Are dreams no hint of that mysterious state — 
Vague interregnum when the heartbeats cease? 
If we're to hold by that criterion, 
Which is but part of living man's economy, 
And say, because a sleep may be profound. 
Without suggestion of a mental act, 
That therefore death is one eternal blank; 
Then we might claim with equal show of right. 
That as our sleep is often wrought with dreams. 
The sleep of death may also have its form 
Of consciousness. And as the mind oft acts 
Without the body's aid, so may the soul. 

SKEPTIC 

Ah ! soul is mind and mind is not a thing. 
But consequence of Matter's interaction; 
For Matter rules — all else is inconceivable. 

FRIEND 

But why, I ask, why risk your future fate 
By snap decisions on so deep a question? 
Accept — at least do not deny the force 
Of intuition's sense, a sixth sense, if you please; 



8 CHAOS 



The sense at which the great agnostic hints.^ 
As all mankind, in every age and clime, 
Has had some vague conception of the soul, 
Why not accord some basis to this faith 
Of deeper import than mere whim of man? 

SKEPTIC 

This talk of soul is trite and patience tries. 
For taking things on faith, I have no taste. 

FRIEND 

It is not faith, but that subconscious sense 
That most men feel but cannot analyze; 
For certain intuitions of mankind 
Lie deeper than the vulgar mind can probe. 

SKEPTIC 

Let sciolists and faddists have their way 
In building doubts from creeds or creeds from doubts. 

FRIEND 

I only urge the normal mind should take 
An attitude of sane receptiveness. 
It's well observed that those who rail the most 

9 The great agnostic — Herbert Spencer. But he was not 
alone in his deference to the fundamental intuitions of mankind. 
Euripides wrote: 

"The simple nameless herd of humanity 

Hath deeds and faith that are truth enough for me." 



PROLOGUE 



At other's faith are oft the blindest slaves, 

Themselves, of faith in some new-fangled cult — 

And brains and culture seem to be no bar 

To this inherent weakness of the vain ; 

For all that's sought, it seems, is novelty, 

Or anything that marks them from the crowd. 

Another class are those half read, half trained, 

Who delve in mysteries beyond their ken 

And take for granted things that suit their whim, 

Or help uphold the folly they maintain. 

SKEPTIC 

What things for granted does the Atheist take? 
You know his cult is absolute denial. 

FRIEND 

No, no, my friend, although he cannot solve 
The simplest problem out of Euclid's book. 
He quotes the distances of every star 
With firm conviction, e'en their size and weight. 
And prates of things his mind could never grasp ; 
Now what, pray tell me, what is this but faith? 
But I perceive you weary of the theme 
Your drowsy lids but mock my argument^ — 
I'll say good-by and wish you pleasant dreams. 

{Exit, Friend) 

Skeptic, in reverie. {Scene darkens.) 



10 CHAOS 



ACT I 



TO-DAY 



Scene. Overlooking the Hudson River. Sunset beyond 
the Palisades. 

Argument. The theme outlined. Sunset described in the 
purlieus of a great city. Reflections on the advance- 
ment of the age in things material. The failure of 
civilization to keep pace with the strides of Science and 
Art. The passions of men are the same in every age. 
The grandeur of the firmament and the insignificance 
of man. 

CHORUS 

Our theme is man's achievements and his end: 
The universe — its grandeur and decay. 
The art of man has weighed the distant stars; 
Deduced their orbits, distances and speed ; 
Divined some inkling of their origin. 
His skill has wrung her secrets from the Earth: 
Sounded her seas, explored their depths and scaled 
Her mountains; wormed himself into her bowels; 
Surveyed her strata, timed their place and age 
And made Creation comprehensible. 
But knowledge ends at that mysterious gate 




'The western hank of Hudson s 
mighty stream." 



TO-DAY II 



Called Death. To that dread portal vistas clear 
Confront his vision — out beyond there lie 
The impenetrable shadows of Eternity. 

SKEPTIC (in reverie) 

The orb of day in gorgeous splendor sinks 
Beyond the Palisades that grimly guard 
The western bank of Hudson's mighty stream; 
And to mine ear there comes the hum of life, 
The murmur of the city's daily toil, 
Which fainter grows as traffic ebbs away: 
A distant drone in deep dull monotone, 
Soft crooning in the vibrant summer air; 
Now chiming into cadence with the trees 
As gentle zephyrs stir their dark green depths 
And rouse the leaves to rustling sibilance. 
Now, hark! the trill of birds the chorus joins 
As fluttering nestward their melodious notes 
Swell Nature's greeting to the reign of Night. 

CHORUS 

Great steamers cleave the waters with their prows 
And hurl the billows surging on the shores. 
While flashing in the sunset glow, the sails 
Of flitting yachts, like moths before a flame, 
Reflect the radiant glory of the sky. 
Anon is heard the clanking clash of steel; 



12 CHAOS 



Huge red-eyed monsters, hissing steam and smoke, 
Resistless come with rush and rumbling roar. 
Like flying serpents loom into the view 
And pass into the twilight — bearing on 
Their various burdens to their different marts. 



SKEPTIC 

Methinks how great the age in which we live; 
How great to join this mighty continent, 
Its every part, with ringing ribs of steel 
And make the journey to Pacific's coast 
But three short days, which would in former times 
Have taken weary months. And then to send 
The human voice a thousand miles or more 
Through wires charged by lightning from the skies. 
And that deed done to send the message then 
Unaided through the ether that we breathe; 
To store by art on cylinders of wax, 
Or rubber discs of more enduring form, 
For future times to hear, the human voice 
And music's noble and enchanting strain; 
Create with ev'ry pleasing sound and note 
Of well-appointed modern orchestra, 
A symphony from work-day dynamos; 
Explore the source and mystery of light 
And vibratory waves of mortal sense unfelt; 
To penetrate b}^ Roentgen rays and see 
Through substances the human eye cannot; 



TO-DAY 13 



Unloose the atoms from their wonted place — 
Weigh, count and clarify their deep intent; 
And by the spectroscope disclose the state, 
The speed and elements of distant stars. 
Of its achievements surely Progress can 
Must justly boast, save in the state of man. 

CHORUS 

While science, art, and manual skill improve, 
No sage has found the formula to change 
The primal moral weakness of the race. 
And those defects of character and heart, 
That men were taught in ancient times to shun. 
Are still the rocks that wreck his happiness. 

SKEPTIC 

For man remains unchanged throughout the years; 
The same, in love, in hate, in war and peace — 
The just, unjust, are quite the same to-day. 
As when the dawn of History began. ^° 

CHORUS 

Beneath the thin veneer and polish of the times, 
There lie concealed the passions of the cave. 

^oWeil expressed in Kipling's 'General Summary*: 
"We are very slightly changed 
From the semi-apes who ranged 
India's prehistoric clay." 



14 CHAOS 



But customs change — the crimson wrath of old 
Has been refined to cold and subtle arts. 
The body is no longer lashed — but, ah ! 
What thorns into tender heart are driven ! 
The basic thought that drove the primitive man 
To reeking altars with his sacrifice, 
Is that which raised the penal stake and cross, 
The torture chamber, wheel and pillory, 
And underlies intolerance to-day ! 

SKEPTIC 

Peruse again the page of History, 
Take heed the fate of mighty nations past 
That rose in ancient times, their zenith reached 
In full development of every art, 
Then sank in hopeless ruins on their plains. 

CHORUS 

The amethyst and turquoise of the sky, 
The carmine glow and topaz hue are gone ; 
The sunset colors melt into a gray, 
And one by one the orbs of night appear. 

SKEPTIC 

There Venus shines resplendent in the west; 
Her narrow orbit does not let her stray 
Far from the God of day. So when she comes. 



TO-DAY 15 



As morning or as evening star, we know 

Her charms are destined not too long to last;^^ 

And even now she's sinking fast and soon 

Will drop into the gloom. But Jupiter, 

The steadfast friend of earth, whose orbit takes 

Him thirty years to turn, shines steadily — 

More like a beacon than celestial orb. 

While Mars, our ruddy neighbor of the skies, 

Provokes the dwellers of this earth to ask. 

If those strange markings, single and in pairs, 

That seem his world-like surface to indent. 

Can be the work of human hands like ours.^^ 

There Saturn with concentric rings appears 

And shows to man the way that worlds are made. ^^ 

CHORUS 

Now in the east the full round moon appears — 
Earth's satellite that rules the surging tides — 
Whose presence pales the mighty distant stars ; 
Its silvery rays lend beauty to the night. 
And beam benignly on the land and sea. 
Withal it is a whited sepulchre — 

11 The orbit of Venus being between that of the earth and the 
sun, the angle which she may subtend during her annual revolu- 
tion is limited. Therefore she is never far above the horizon, 
either as an evening or as a morning star. 

12 The lines discovered by, and named after, the Italian 
astronomer, Giovanni Schiaparelli. 

13 See note on Nebular Hypothesis, p. 17. 



l6 CHAOS 



Celestial portent of the fate of earth. 
No atmosphere to soothe the solar wrath, 
Its arid plains all parched and waterless; 
Its sterile slopes and craters cavernous, 
Reveal to man the way that worlds shall die. 



SKEPTIC 

Out in the deep blue vault of Heaven shine 
Vast suns to which our sun is but a grain 
Of sand ; whose light it takes some thousand years 
To reach our human eyes; and yet beyond ^^ 
The limits of the faintest stars revealed 
By mighty telescopes there well may be, 
In depths remote, still other stars, and Nebulae, 
The womb of suns and systems yet unborn.^^ 

CHORUS 

Alas, how insignificant is man — 
An atom by the infinite overwhelmed ! 
How wide, how deep the universe; how grand, 
Magnificent the scale on which it's planned! 

^^Astronomers estimate that there are approximately one 
billion stars within the range of human vision through the instru- 
mentality of the modern telescope. All of these stars are suns 
like the great orb which gives us day and night. But our sun is 
a mere pygmy compared to the stupendous bodies visible to us 
at night as twinkling stars in the heavens. The distances of 



TO-DAY 17 



these stars stagger the imagination. To make the figures compre- 
hensible, astronomers have adopted a new unit of measurement, 
namely, the distance which light traveling at the rate of 186,000 
miles every second traverses in a year. This is called a "light-year." 
Distances up to one hundred light-years have been measured with 
gratifying accuracy. Probably half of the stars visible to the 
naked eye are more than four hundred light-years distant; while 
as to the telescopic stars up to the tenth magnitude the majority 
are probably over one thousand light-years from us. In the 
plane of the Milky Way, the stars probably extend in all direc- 
tions to a distance of from eight to ten thousand light-years. 
At right angles to the plane of the Milky Way the stars seem to 
thin out considerably at five hundred light-years and none have 
been measured more than sixteen thousand light-years from the 
central plane. Our stellar system is probably a vast flattened 
aggregation of stars about fifteen thousand light-years in diameter 
and from two to three thousand light-years in thickness. The 
part most thickly set with stars appears to our view as the "Milky 
Way." The smaller Magellanic Nebula in the southern celestial 
sphere is said to be at a distance of thirty thousand light-years. 

15 The Nebular Hypothesis. The presence of those mysterious 
clusters in the heavens not only suggests, but, by their form, con- 
stitution and movement, gives apparent confirmation to the 
most plausible theory yet advanced for the evolution of the 
universe. Nebulae have always been the subject of keen interest. 
At first they were assumed to be only clusters of stars; but the 
failure of the largest telescope to resolve them into separate bodies 
awakened the first doubt as to their constitution. Then came the 
revelations of the spectroscope which showed them to be, not 
clusters of remote minute stars, but chaotic aggregations of 
luminous matter showing clearly defined signs of spiral, ellipticixl 
and circular motion. 

The Nebular Hypothesis had its inception successively and 
independently in the minds of Swedenborg, Kant and Laplace. 
Let us extend its application by indulging in a corollary which 



l8 CHAOS 



the state of physical science in their day would not have justi- 
fied: 

Assume all of the primary elements lying dormant in the vast 
void of the universe. Without motion there can be no heat. 
In the intense cold of the great void the gaseous elements would 
be first liquefied, then solidified. (Oxygen, Nitrogen and Hydro- 
gen have been solidified by man by ingenious processes.) The 
moment that the process of liquefaction or solidification set in 
the law of gravitation would instantly become a factor in their 
destiny. Centers of gravity form; attractions are generated and 
movement begins. With movement comes friction, heat, com- 
bustion and light. With heat the gaseous elements are dissolved 
fronx solid form into liquids or assume their gaseous state. The 
heaviest elements, singly or in combination, will form Nuclei 
toward which the others will gravitate. Affinities assert them- 
selves and as the elements converge, cross or touch one another 
in the great maelstrom, chemical combinations are made and 
new substances take birth. 

The converging masses assume spherical forms. As more and 
more aggregations of matter impinge on the embryo spheres, it 
would be a miracle if they were all evenly distributed. The slightest 
irregularity would change the balance and set up a rotary motion 
— a motion which the surrounding atmosphere and particles 
within the zone of gravitation would quite reasonably follow. 
When the central masses condensed sufficiently they would mani- 
fest themselves as stars or suns with vaporous masses about 
them extending to the limits of their range of attraction. As 
condensation proceeded the central masses would be detached 
and the vaporous envelopes would divide into rings — each ring 
the progenitor of a planetary system. We may imagine the 
same process to go on in the condensation of the planetary rings in 
the formation of satellites. Saturn with his rings stands out to-day 
as an example of world-making fortunately vouchsafed for our 
study and reflection. The density of Saturn is less than that of 
water. The planet is in its formative state. It will, no doubt, 



TO-DAY 19 



pass through the same process as the earth — Oxygen and Hydro- 
gen forming water; Oxygen and Nitrogen forming an atmosphere. 
The heavier matters contained in the surrounding envelope, 
attracted to the planet, will break through the atmosphere, 
impinge on the water, sink to the center and solidify in due 
course. The Nebulae in Orion, Andromeda, Lyra and Canes 
Venatici are visible examples of how solar systems are evolved. 



20 CHAOS 



ACT II 



TO-MORROW 



Argument. The skeptic, in a dream, views as a spectator, 
apart from the world, its progress and decay through 
many ages. Beholds wars and internecine dissensions 
of the races. The improvidence of man and its punish- 
ment: sterility, plague and famine. Old age of the 
world. 

CHORUS 

Long ages seem to pass as in a dream. 
Before us panoramic visions rise : 
Of man, his life and growth, and future fate; 
Of earth, its changes in the course of time. 

SKEPTIC 

I seem to drift in upper air serene 
And view with vague delight the rolling sphere. 
Before me lies a virgin plain untrod 
Up sloping gently from the silver sea. ^ 

I gaze again — as if by magic*s art — 
There come the signs of life, the homes of men. 
And these increase in number as I gaze. 
Until the village has become a town; 
The town, a city of enormous size. 



TO-MORROW 21 



CHORUS 

The city's streets encroach on farm and field; 
The wood, the dell, the babbling brook are gone, 
And nature's beauties, by the vandal hand 
Of highly wrought refinement, have been marred. 
The iron rails of traffic span the earth ; 
The smoke and steam of factories obscure 
The purple vault of Heaven with its stars; 
Their chimneys quite o'ercap the churches' spires; 

SKEPTIC 

Throughout the streets and avenues appear 
Inhabitants preoccupied with all 
The joys and sorrows of their narrow lives. 
And thus the world in every part becomes 
The home of teeming millions of mankind. 

CHORUS 

But yet man seems, though skilled in every art. 
To cling persistently to savage ways 
And scorn the gentle voice of Charity and Peace ; 
For moral sense still keeps in infancy, 
And foolish man has failed to grasp the thought : 
That though his wealth should rival Croesus' dream, 
And culture reach its apex in all arts; 
Though science penetrate through every veil, 
That keeps the unknown from his vision, yet. 
If not applied to help his fellow-man, 
The strides of knowledge and of art are vain. 



22 CHAOS 



SKEPTIC 

Contending armies battle on the land, 
And steel-clad navies on the ocean clash. 
Upon their issue destiny appears 
To hang the fate of all the trembling world. 
Then greedy powers rob their prostrate foes; 
Assign among themselves and loyal friends 
Their so-called separate spheres of influence ! 
Thus nations rise and fall and maps are changed. 



CHORUS 

Grim war shall last while greed and hate endure; ^® 
So long as locks and bolts our treasures guard, 
Or watchmen pace the narrow dimlit street ; 
So long as oaths are taken in our courts 
Or bonds demanded to secure just debts; 

1^ Since this was written the greatest war in history has been 
fought and twelve million of the manhood of the world and 
countless numbers of its womanhood have fallen in battle or died 
in consequence of its accompanying horrors. By so much has the 
potentiality of the human race for future civilization been de- 
pleted and impaired. In so far as paganistic ideas may have 
been crushed and higher ideals stimulated in the human mind, 
let us hope that the world is better for the sacrifice. Yet, judging 
from the attitude of some of the nations at the peace table — 
their greed, their selfishness — there is little ground for hope that 
they have taken seriously to heart the true lesson of the war. 



TO-MORROW 23 



So long as vice impels the human heart 
And self's the mainspring of a sordid world. 
While kings for greed invoke the God of War 
So long must nations stand upon their guard. 
Against the curse of war there's one recourse — 
The sword is yet its own best antidote. 
Against injustice to resist is right — 
When Might offends the only shield is Might! 



SKEPTIC 

Internal strife embitters every land; 
The rich still richer grow, the poor more poor; 
The tyranny of Capital bears down 
Its yoke relentless on the toiler's neck — 
An ill much greater than abuse of kings. 
Injustice, Hate and Fear go hand in hand; 
Domestic strife divides the husband, wife; 
Their children often bitter foes of both ; 
The courts of law still gravely sit with pomp 
In technical denial of equity; 



CHORUS 

And votes are brazen bought and brazen sold. 
In every walk of life Corruption stalks 
With smiling face to coax the weakling man — 
Her right hand holds the shining cursed gold ; 



24 CHAOS 



But in its midst is hid the canker worm of death 
And all who touch it fester at the heart — 
Both they and their posterity are curst. 



SKEPTIC 

Vast steamers swarm in every gulf and bay 
And streak the greater oceans with their foam. 
While in the air audacious man in glee 
Has shamed the feathered couriers of the sky. 



CHORUS 

The ten .commandments, which on Zion's Mount 
To Moses, prophet of the Jews, were given, 
Are idly mouthed or calmly laughed to scorn — 
The symbols of a better age overthrown 
And pagan idols in their places raised — 
Upon all sides decadence swiftly spreads. 

By paradox unique an attribute. 
Most worthy and sublime — the love of Him, 
The great first cause, the Father of Mankind, 
Has been transformed to anger, hate and fear. 
A thousand creeds divide the human race. 
Each claims its own, the only road to bliss. 
And vows all others doomed to Hell's Abyss. 



TO-MORROW 25 



SKEPTIC 

The Christian creed in scores of warring sects 
Is split in vain dissensions o'er mere texts 
From the great book from which they all have sprung. 
As though a God all merciful and just 
Would spurn the longing of a single soul, 
Sincerely striving to attain His love, 
Obey His law and pay Him reverence. 
Thus foolish man vies with his fellow-man, 
To reach the goal of Heaven's Golden Gate 
By wrangling on diverging paths of hate. 

CHORUS 

In earlier days there had been some respect 
For virtue — heroes smiling gave their blood 
For freedom and uplifting of the race; 
But when the growth of luxury increased 
And competition keener had become. 
Both envious pride and selfish greed combined 
To make men fight like soulless animals 
For mere existence; then the good Samaritan 
Was banished from their lives, and in his place 
Were Hate and Fear and unfair Rivalry. 

Despite its noble past it is a dying race ; 
For white and yellow, brown, red, black are one, 
And all the divers tribes of each, which have, 
Throughout long ages, warred with varying fate 



26 CHAOS 



In struggles for supremacy, are merged 

Into a common stream of mediocrity — 

The vices of the worst commingled with 

The vices of the best ; the virtues of 

The best dragged down to one dead average. 

And in their selfish aims, their lust, their greed, 

They quite forget there comes a day of reckoning. 

SKEPTIC 

The fertile land, that once so fairly bloomed 
With every blessing of the field and vine, 
Is desolate, and deserts mark the site 
Of splendid cities, populous and great. 

CHORUS 

The forest shade that dulled the sun*s fierce ray 
And tempered winds that blew from ice-chilled lands ; 
Whose gnarled and tangled roots upheld the soil 
And stayed the angry rivers' ruthless flood ; 
Whose verdure drew the welcome rain and made 
The earth to smile in beauty and abundance; 
Ungrateful man, unmindful of the past. 
Has burned in wilful waste, or hewed for greed 
To fill the gaping jaws of Industry.^^ 

^7 There is no doubt that the beginning of the downfall of 
many ancient lands may be directly traced to their disregard of 
forest preservation. To-day the making of paper from wood 



TO-MORROW 



Oh, Man improvident! insensible that Fate 
Condemns the least infraction of the Law, 
That Wisdom throughout nature hath ordained. 
And for each trespass, soon or late, exacts, 
Without a qualm, her meed of punishment — 
Ye have lacked in every age the foresight to preserve 
The source from which your greatest gifts have come, 
And now behold your cherished cities meet. 
With all their art, their learning, and their wealth, 
The doom of Ninevah and Babylon ! 

Now plague and famine show their heads abhorred 
And sweep their countless millions off the earth. 
In vain the farmer tills the sterile soil; 
The roots are withered e'er the shoots have grown — 
The soil is barren for the world is old. 

pulp and the greed of industry in cutting down our forests en- 
dangers the future of man and requires that immediate steps be 
taken co-operatively by all the nations of the world to put into 
practice the wise precaution that for every tree cut down another 
should be planted. 



28 CHAOS 



ACT III 



THE END OF MAN 



Argument. The skeptic, having witnessed the culmina- 
tion, now beholds the running down of progress — The 
gradual depopulation of the Earth. General desolation. 
The ruins of great cities described. The death of 
the last man. Observations on the futility of human 
achievements and ambitions. 

SKEPTIC 

The sun now shines with fainter light than when 
In earlier days it stirred a fertile globe 
With myriad forms of palpitating life; 
His feeble rays of reddish orange hue 
Diffuse on earth a hazy twilight glow. 

CHORUS 

The panorama now appears reversed — 
Instead of life, activity and growth. 
That in the former pictures were so marked, 
There seems to be a running down, as when 
A clock exhausted slowly tolls the hour. 
The icy caps that decked the poles 




"The steel-framed structures that 
once pierced the sky." 



THE END OF MAN 29 

With narrow margins, toward Equator creep, 
In snow-white, fate-like, rings of death; ^^ 

SKEPTIC 

The towns and cities that once spread the plains 
Seem palpably to shrink before my view — 
Their buildings gently crumble into earth. 

CHORUS 

The steel-framed structures that once pierced the sky, 
And were the marvel of man's handiwork, 
Have tottered to their doom reluctantly. 
The brick and stone that cased their skeletons 
Have sunk into the dust about their base; 
While pier and girder web-like naked stand 
Sad relics of man's bootless industry. 
And when the earth revolves its back upon 
The fading sun, and twilight's feeble glow 
Has changed to inky night, the twinkling stars 
Gleam mockingly between the iron tracery. 

^8 This refers to the return of the glacial period, which will 
probably be the precurser of the end of the world as a place of 
habitation. The next recurrence, ending the present geologic 
stage, may not, and most probably will not, end the world's life 
history. The finding of extensive coal-beds within the Arctic 
and Antarctic circles indicates a prolific vegetation in those 
regions which may be accounted for by the variation in the 
inclination of the earth's axis to the plane of the ecliptic during 
the course of the revolution of our solar system through the 
great nebula of which our solar system forms a part. 



30 CHAOS 



SKEPTIC 

Great bridges that once spanned the rivers' tide — 
Colossus-like in towering majesty 
Of stone and steel — erected with a skill 
That taxed the ingenuity of man ; 
Beneath whose interlacing members passed 
The tallest masts of ships that sailed the seas; 
Now fallen and dismembered choke the course 
Through which the tumbling waters roar, and wake 
Resounding murmurs from the death-like shores. 

CHORUS 

Where once the streets and avenues have rung 
With human steps and traffic's noisy strain; 
With sounds of joy or mortal agony; 
A strange dread silence now pervades the scene. 
Anon the sparse inhabitants emerge 
From out their shelter in some ruined shrine 
And totter feebly, aimlessly about; 
Their footsteps echo in once busy streets 
Like heart beats in a dismal sepulchre. 

SKEPTIC 

My vision now seems limited to grow; 
Instead of broad expanse of land and sea. 
Diversified by mountain, vale and bay, 
I see a parching plain with many stones 
Of various shapes in great disorder strewn — 




'Great bridges that once spanned 
the river's tide" 



THE END OF MAN 3I 

The ruins of some old metropolis. 
Unburied bodies lie in heaps around 
And bones of mortals bleaching on the sand. 
There is no sign of life save in one place, 
That seems the cellar of some ancient edifice. 

CHORUS 

Behold, within is spread a rough skin rug 
And on it lies a man in writhing agony. 
His breath comes fast and restless move his arms; 
Anon he plaintive calls a woman's name — ^^ 
Now all is still! 

SKEPTIC 

But, look! there seems to rise 
A mist-like thing or shape of shadowy form ; 
But yet of beauty undefinable; 
Mysterious, weird, and awe-inspiring: 
And, as it hovers for a moment by 
The body whence it seems to emanate, 
The air is filled with perfume of sweet flowers. 
Dread premonitions fill my tortured mind — 
I dare not question what it all can mean. 

CHORUS 

It means the end of man and end of earth! 

1* Woman — the strongest and most enduring tie that binds 
man to earth. 



32 CHAOS 



SKEPTIC 

Thus dies the race that aimed to pierce the veil 
Of things eternal and of things unknown! 
Yes, this the race perfection hoped to reach 
In youthful dreams of the millennium. 



CHORUS 

What counts ambition now, or miser's greed — 
What recks the toil by which their ends were reached? 
The power and pelf of all the world shall fade ! 
Where is the gain when all must pass away? 

SKEPTIC 

A library far-famed in all the land, 
Upon a hill in stately ruin stands; 
Resisting time and dissolution's force 
With utmost strength of massive masonry. 
A fungus growth half cloaks the crumbling walls- 
Kind nature's aid to hide the scars of time. 
The columns of the grand fagade 
Uphold no more the shattered pediment; 
The dome and roof have fallen to decay, 
And block the aisles and corridors in which 
The learning of long ages has been stored. 
Books! books! aisle after aisle and tier on tier — 
Unread, unopened, thick with dust of years! 



,^ 




'A library far-famed in 
all the land." 



THEENDOFMAN 33 

I gaze in sadness, while upon me creeps, 
A shade of awe, unspeakable regret, 
That here man^s wisdom has its limit reached ! 
That here the fame of sage and poet ends — 
Between the covers of these musty tomes 1 
What toil and mental energy were spent ! 
What pains, discouragements, ambitions wrecked, 
While their poor authors strove for name and fame ! 



CHORUS 

A fame, alas, not more enduring now 
Than that of those who lived without a thought 
Of present or of future praise or blame. 
Oh, Fame ! thou art a futile bubble blown. 
The toy of fate, the idol of great minds! 



SKEPTIC 

The hall wherein the Legislature sat 
(Vicarious symbol of a pygmy race), 
Pretentious capitol that was, is now 
No more. The ornate arch and sculptured vault, 
The columns, stairs, the rail and balustrade 
All richly wrought, lie broken and awry ; 
And midst the crumbling statues of the great 
The screech owl sits in solemn irony. 



34 CHAOS 



CHORUS 

Here orators descanted on the times 
And tried to turn the course of nature back, 
In vain attempts to make man good by rule 
Until all sense of human liberty was lost ; 
Oblivious that by nature's higher law 
It is ordained that those who fall to vice, 
A prey to their own weakness, are not meant 
To flourish or perpetuate the race. 
Forgetting this their vain effeminate laws 
Destroyed all strength of will, all exercise 
Of moral force and quelled initiative — 
Pampered, humored, circumscribed as well — 
And thus upraised a coddled race of weaklings.^o 



SKEPTIC 

The high-domed Court where Justice sat enthroned, 
Coerced to blush as her gold-burnished scales 
Insidiously sank to either side, 
And wished the bandage from her eyes withdrawn 
To wield the sword her helpless hand engrasped; 

20 You cannot legislate into the human heart the ten command- 
ments. They were written on stone. Think of that! You can- 
not make men good or sober or virtuous by law; but you may 
destroy the human will by law. If men cannot live cleanly 
nature sentences them to death. If nations do not live uprightly 
they too must die. 



THEENDOFMAN 35 

Where lawyers quibbled, litigants forswore 

And truth discouraged trembled at the door. 

The shrine wherein the preacher marked the way, 

That man should go to win eternal life — • 

The narrow way which he himself hath sped — 

Oblivious of all other ways than his, 

Which might as likely lead to God's eternal throne; 

The school of learning where the restless seer, 

Tugged at the veil of the unknowable — 

All, all are sunk in crumbling ruined heaps! 



CHORUS 

In yonder field where once the willows grew, 
Were serried ranks of humble soldier dead — 
The graves of those whose only claim to fame 
Was that they fought the battles of their land. 
Above each grassy mound a modest slab 
But briefly told their date of birth and death, 
Their name, their Company and Regiment. 
Overshadowing these were huge majestic shafts, 
With graven records of more glorious deeds — 
As if 'twere nobler to give up one's life, 
In epaulets on horseback than on foot. 
The pride of birth and arrogance of place 
Are here reduced, in last analysis, 
To common clay from which they all have sprung. 



36 CHAOS 



SKEPTIC 

Of what avail are monuments high reared 
Above insensate clay ; how vain the hope, 
That lingers in the breast of man, to keep, 
By crumbling stone and fading epitaph, 
Posterity apprised of mortal fame. 
That dies with the last man to read the tale. 

CHORUS 

The marble mausoleum of the rich ; 
The lofty shaft above the warrior's bones, 
No higher stand nor more conspicuous 
Than humble slab that marks the plowman's grave! 
And show — strange irony of human fate — 
The vanity of worldly ostentation, 
When none are left to profit by the lesson. 



Ki:; 







''The crumbling world is vitrified 
and bare." 



DISINTEGRATION 37 



ACT IV 

DISINTEGRATION 

Argument. The skeptic beholds a world vitrified and 
bare — no sign of vegetation or water. The seas have 
dried up. Suddenly the whole earth crumbles before 
his gaze. Is overwhelmed with horror at his isolation. 
The sun gradually fades and disappears. He now 
becomes conscious that he is without material form. 
Drifts through the universe. The end of gravitation 
and of nature's laws. The reign of Disintegration 
begins. The gradual disappearance of the stars. 
Hears the thunders and beholds the myriad scintilla- 
tions of their final disintegration. 

CHORUS 

Now turn your glance upon a purpled sky, 
Bedecked with constellations, and behold 
The solemn sweep of systems through the universe. 
Red comets flash on their erratic course 
Past stars that faithful keep their orbits' path — ^i 
The shining milestones of Eternity. 

21 With respect to the earth and the solar system, the stars 
have no orbit. With respect to us pygmies in the vast universe, 
they are fixed and immovable. Yet they are doubtless pursuing 



38 CHAOS 



SKEPTIC 

The desert world shines with a pallid light ; 
There is no sign of verdure on the plains; 
The streams are dried, the forests all are gone; 
The seas no longer lap the sloping shores ; 
The foaming cataracts at last are still — 
No breath of life bestirs the livid waste. 

CHORUS 

The human race has passed and left no mark 
Of its achievements, habitation there 
Throughout the countless years; nor yet the trace 
Of wondrous lower life, that was the spur 
Of thought to man, is seen. The spider's web; 
The hill of ants and labyrinths within ; 
The nests of birds intelligently wrought; 
And all the marvels of the living world 
Have long been swept into oblivion. 

SKEPTIC 

The crumbling world is vitrified and bare — 
Lo! while I gaze, from some internal force, 

their magnificent way in regular rotation — even as our sun and 
his satellites are moving onward upon their appointed path. 
Astronomers are generally agreed that there is a well-established 
movement of our solar system in the general direction of Vega, 
in the constellation of Lyra. 



DISINTEGRATION 39 

Its surface breaks into a thousand forms, 

Which burst apart and scatter like a shell 

Ejected from some huge artillery! 

A flash of flame that marks the fateful blast, 

A cloud of smoke that follows in its wake 

Attract the eye a moment and dissolve. 

The fragments spread throughout the cavernous void 

And vanish like the dust before the wind ! 



CHORUS 

A deep resounding crash abruptly breaks 
In monstrous volume ripping through the void! 
The ether trembles at the awful shock, 
Then rolling onward rumbling into space 
It sinks into a murmur and expires. 



SKEPTIC 

'Twas day a moment since, but now 'tis night. 
Without the vanished Earth's reflected light, 
A deep and solemn shade o'erspreads the scene. 
I seem transfixed and poised within 
The hollow of the great celestial sphere. 
The glittering stars make radiant the depths — 
Above, beneath, on every side they gleam 
With cold and calm relentless brilliancy 
And taunting mock my helpless isolation. 



40 CHAOS 



Disconsolate I gaze in poignant grief. 
Up to this moment I have had some hope — 
An undefined and subtle confidence, 
That all these changing scenes were but a dream; 
That soon or late I should return to earth. 
But now when I perceive my refuge gone, 
Without a thought or hope of other port, 
A chill of horror overwhelms my heart — 
Such horror as might fill the mind of some 
Poor mariner marooned upon a rock 
To die alone out on the boundless sea. 

Like traveller returned from wandering, 
Who halts afar to gaze upon the scene 
Of boyhood's haunts and home he had so loved, 
And finds no trace of those familiar signs, 
His memory had cherished through the years; 
So I gaze vainly, anxiously and long 
Upon the void where once the world revolved. 

The sun, which for some time, has grown more dim. 
Now drowsily it drags athwart the sky, 
With molten metal's deep expiring glow. 
Upon me now there dawns the weird import 
Of that dull disc in heaven's darkling vault. 

CHORUS 

Art thou the famed Aurora of the classic age, 
Whose chariot swept the eastern sky at morn 




'Art thou the famed Aurora of 
the classic age?" 



DISINTEGRATION 4I 

And touched the clouds and mountain tops with fire? 
Aye, this is the genial sun whose rising gleam, 
Once waked the birds to sing their morning hymn; 
Whose radiance hung the dew-clad trees with pearls, 
And warmed again the fecund earth to life ! 
To this sad state has sunk the bounteous source 
Whence flowed the vital force of many worlds ! 
Fainter and fainter grow the dying rays, 
At last its outline softly, slowly blends 
Upon the sullen background of the sky ! 
'Tis but a spot, a ghastly blur — 'tis naught 
But one dead cinder more in heaven's mighty deep! 

SKEPTIC 

Anon my meditation is disturbed 
By consciousness of some o'ermastering force. 
That bears me irresistibly away. 
I feel the sense of inward struggle strong ; 
But seem to know to struggle were in vain. 
Then comes the shock, the fearful consciousness, 
That I am now without material form — 
A spiritual speck aswirl in space; 
An atom fluttering in the star beams 1 

Then like an arrow darting to its goal 
Among the shining stars my path is shaped. 
But, ah, how changed! the Pleiades have lost 
Not one, but many orbs; Orion stands 



42 CHAOS 



Shorn of his belt and shining sword; 

Rigel and Betelgeuse are fading fast. 

The Little Bear and Polar Star whose ray 

Has guided long poor mortals on their way; 

Vega, Arcturus and Capella's glow, 

That once did make night brilliant on old earth, 

Have sunk into the shadow of the past. 

The Sailors* Plow, Great Bear, and Southern Cross 

And all the constellations I have loved. 

Are crippled remnants of their former selves ; 

And that trite phrase philosophers have wrought 

About the 'Eternal' stars is proved awry. 

From star to star in ceaseless round I reel 
And at each circuit see some orb decay. 
Yes, one by one the stars recede and die. 
Or break in countless atoms on my view. 

CHORUS 

Disintegration now begins its reign 
And nothing seems to hold its entity. 
Cohesion and affinity that kept 
The molecules and atoms in their place 
And gave to matter its variety. 
Its properties and attributes, are dead; 
And in their place repulsion is the rule. 
The basic elements are now unloosed. 



DISINTEGRATION 43 

Resolved into their primal form and fly 
Precipitate to outer realms of space. 
For gravitation's force has ceased to act 
And marks the end of nature's cherished laws. 

SKEPTIC 
'Tis thus with matter, what now of the soul — 
If such there is — shall it too pass away? 
So I have thought, and still am doomed to think. 
It were a shame indeed if those great minds, 
Whose deeds advanced the welfare of the race ; 
Whose labors lent a halo to their age. 
Should be resolved at last to nothingness. 
Eternal justice wakes the pregnant thought, 
Whate'er the fate of things material. 
Oblivion shall not claim the human soul. 

CHORUS 
Now crash on crash alarms the silent void ; 
The infinite sphere is rent with shriek and roar — 
No mortal ear could bear the awful din — 
As thunders piled on thunders, far and near, 
Reverberate and echo from the depths. 
While lights fantastic gleam on every side ; 
From merest specks at first, they swelling grow 
Like trembling rainbows, lace and interlace ; 
Break into myriad forms and scintillate, 
Until the double arch of heaven's vault, 
Vibrates and thrills with weird supernal light. 



44 CHAOS 



Then by degrees the violent glare abates ; 
The varied colors blend and slowly fade. 
As when the summer's thunder-storm is past, 
The fitful glow of lightning sweeps the sky; 
So now the lightning's flash illumes the closing scene 
And distant thunders mutter in the void — 
Then all is dark and still. 



"V 



'^' 





'A peace-dispensing radiance 
filled the scene." 



THE SKEPTIC IN CHAOS 45 



ACT V 

THE SKEPTIC IN CHAOS 

Argument. Cimmerian darkness realized. No light, no 
life, no sound. Awakening of the soul, rebellion. 
Ceaseless motion for long ages through the immeasur- 
able depths of space. A spirit derelict. Agony and 
despair. A cry for mercy. Consciousness of other 
souls' existence. 

CHORUS 

Now has arrived the all-enduring night! 
And in the broad expanse of universe 
No friendly orb remains to guide the way. 
Cimmerian darkness is at last conceived ; 
All light, all life, all sound has ceased — the universe 
Is silent, still, throughout its infinite extent — 
A silence deep and awful as eternity. 

SKEPTIC 

And I alone am left in the appalling shade — 
The only conscious speck in all the void • 
The only thing that keeps its entity; 
The only living atom in the wreck of worlds. 



46 CHAOS 



Up to this moment I endure the pain 
Of my abandonment with stoic zeal 
And have not sought to question what I was, 
Or what my destiny; for soon methought 
This dream, infliction or whate'er it is, 
Will doubtless end in everlasting sleep. 



I seem to thread eternal fastnesses — 
Now falling from tremendous heights I sink 
Into the dark, the silent dismal depths; 
Again I rise in flights immeasurable. 
I strive to rest but find no pillow but — 
The yawning chasm of the frightful void 
And sink again to depths unfathomable. 
Now swirled in eddies of some hidden force. 
To unknown realms by ruthless currents driven- 
A human phantom doomed to endless life ; 
A spirit derelict in endless space. 
Hark! strange sounds become articulate; 
A solemn voice from out the darkness swells : — 



CHORUS 

Vain man, if thou'rt sufficient for thyself 
And matter only is thy hope, let it be so, 
Material is all thou'U ever know! 



THE SKEPTIC IN CHAOS 47 

SKEPTIC 

At intervals strange shapes in myriads 
Of varied hue, self-luminous, athwart 
The darksome void incontinently sweep; 
And as they pass I seem to hear the wail 
Of human souls in dire agony. 

Then comes the thought, indefinite and dull — 
But whereat I rebel with conscious shame — 
The wonderful reflection that the soul 
As well as matter too may well survive ; 



CHORUS 

For nothing dies — nor deed, nor word, nor thought 
Although their memory perchance may fade — 
Somewhere, sometime, 'though in some other sphere, 
There comes from distant long-forgotten shore 
A whisper rising to sweet melody, 
Or murmur rumbling into dissonant 
Deep thunder peal to punish or reward. 



SKEPTIC 

And now the consciousness of soul creeps in, 
Commands my being and asserts itself: — 



48 CHAOS 



CHORUS 

Matter resolved into its elements 
Or decomposed into its primal state 
To human eyes is imperceptible. 
Great though the power of lens to magnify, 
No eye has e'er discerned the atom's form; 
Nor yet the shape of larger molecule; 
Yet in a single atom you aver 
Electrons swim that taunt your chemistry .22 
What then, O man, is matter that you know 
But visible forms of things you cannot see? 
Ye who believe that matter has no end, 
Why not extend your logic to the soul? 
Must sense e'er be the test of man's belief? 
Must he reject his intuition's guide 
And ever with negation stifle hope? 
Why drive it out from your Philosophy? 
Who taught the infant chick to break its shell? 
Who taught the busy ant its house to build? 
Who taught the spider weave its wondrous web? 
And last who taught your first forefathers bend 
The head in worship of the unknown God? 
He who ignores the spiritual side within 

22 Electrons. The theory is advanced that electrons are the 
basic constituents of matter — that even the Atom is not the 
last unit into which matter may be reduced; thus tending to 
confirm the Monistic theory of Haeckel. They are said to have 
a mass equal to i-i 700th of an atoi?i of Hydrogen. 



THE SKEPTIC IN CHAOS 49 

Is like the worm in egotist content, 

Too satisfied within his cramped abode 

To break the shell that keeps him from the world ; 

Not knowing that beyond the fragile wall 

There is an outer and a greater life. 

SKEPTIC 

What sounds are these; which less in words than waves 
Of thought home-pressing with compelling force, 
Bore into my being and arouse strange fears? 

CHORUS 

A disembodied worm within the shell 
Of prejudice upbuilt in former life. 
Alas, the awful truth has dawned too late 
There can be now no surcease from his fate. 



SKEPTIC 

My thoughts run back and mournful I recall 
The skill and wisdom of an age long past; 
An age that gained the mastery of matter ; 
That from the dead evolved new life and use. 
And from the waste the workmen did reject. 
Reformed and recreated other forms. 
Might not that Providence, that's said to rule. 
Perform with souls and immaterial things 



50 CHAOS 



What man has done with things material? 
Recall the scattered ions from the void 
And recreate anew the universe? 
Endow again the indestructible soul 
With other forms more beautiful incarnate- 
So death and life shall constitute a chain 
In endless cycles of everlasting good? 



CHORUS 

Without the stars to mark the flight of time 
He cannot tell the ages that have passed, 
Nor yet conceive the ages still to pass 
Ere he shall be released from his unhappy plight. 

SKEPTIC 

With all the boundless stretch of universe 
At my disposal yet I seem to be 
A prisoner fast locked to endless motion. 

CHORUS 

The dark, the dreadful silence of the void; 
The cold, unfelt, but notwithstanding known; 
The sense of misery wrought by consciousness 
Of inability to rest or sleep; 



THE SKEPTIC IN CHAOS 51 

The fearful lonesomeness of deprivation 
Of human company, o'ermasters pride; 
Weighs down his spirit and his tortured soul — 



SKEPTIC 
Oh, God have mercy! Hear my anguished cry! 

CHORUS 

Mark at the word the awful motion ends 
Sweet music falls upon his famished ears 
And to his eyes there comes the blessed light ; 
A peace dispensing radiance fills the scene. 
And then there comes from out the weary ages. 
The sound of voices; then the consciousness 
Of other souls* existence — voices that 
Salute with welcome and a cheerful hail : 
Rest^ rest at last in sweet eternal peace! 

SKEPTIC {awakens) 

Who spoke? Am I in Death's embrace or dreaming? 
Give me some token. Lord, to wake my faculties! 
The summer breeze across my fevered brow 
Blows gently, and, before my wearied eyes, 
The myriad stars, which Westward sink to rest, 
Flash out their welcome from the deep blue vault. 



52 CHAOS 



The time perchance is near the Midnight hour; 
The sailor's constellation and Great Bear 
Have leaped a quarter circuit round the Polar Star. 
Thank God, I live! — have not been dead for ages; 
But, oh, more blest, the soul aroused within 
Apprises me that I shall never die. 



INDEX 



53 



INDEX 

{Numbers indicate pages. Notes are indicated by *) 



Aeronauts 24 

iEschylus, Persians (Intro- 
duction) xiii 

Affinity 42 

Agnostic * 8 

Ambition 32 

Andromeda, Nebula in * . 19 
Aristophanes (Introduc- 
tion) xii 

Armies 22 

Arrow 41 

Atheist 9 

Atoms 13 

Aurora 40 

Books .32 

Bridges 30 

Canes Venatici, Nebula in * 19 

Charity 21 

Cimmerian Darkness ... 45 

City's Streets 21 

Chorus, Greek Drama (In- 
troduction) xi 

Christianity 25 

Cohesion 42 

Constellations . . . . 41, 42 
Corruption 23 



Courts 34 

Creeds 8, 25 

Cults 9 

Culture 21 

Customs 14 

Day of Reckoning .... 26 

Death 11 

Decadence 24 

Deserts 26 

Disintegration, Reign of . 42 

Domestic Strife 23 

Dreams 7 

Eschenburg, Professor J. J. 

(Introduction) . . . . xi 

Electrons* 48 

Elements, Chemical * . . i 

Elements 42 

Empedocles * 2 

Epitaphs 36 

Euripides * (Intro, xi) . . 8 

Factories 21 

Faith 8 

Fame 33 

Fertile Land 26 



54 



CHAOS 



Fire Worshippers .... 6 

Folly 8 

Footsteps 30 

Forests 26 

Forest Preservation * . . 26 

Glaciers . 28 

Glacial Period * 29 

Greek Drama (Introduc- 
tion) xi 

Haeckel, Ernst H.* ... 48 

Heroes 25 

History 14 

Hydrogen * 3» 18 

Immortality (see Soul) 

Injustice 23 

Internal Strife 23 

Intolerance 14 

Intuitions * 8 

Jews 24 

Jupiter 15 

Justice 34 

Kant, Immanuel * .... 17 

Kipling, Rudyard * ... 13 

Laplace, Pierre Simon . . 17 

Laws . 34 

Lawyers 35 

Lavoisier * 3 



Learning, School of . . . .35 

Legislature 33 

Light ......... 17 

Light- Year * ...... 17 

Lightning and Thunder . 44 

Luxury 25 

Lyra, Nebula in * . . . .19 

Magellanic Nebula * . . .17 

Man 16, 21 

Mars 15 

Matter 48 

Matter, Mastery of ... 49 

Millennium 32 

Milton's Samson Agonistes 

(Introduction) . . . . xii 

Molecules .42 

Monistic Theory * . . . .48 
Monuments ....... 36 

Moon 15 

Morality, legislating * . . 34 
Moral Weakness . . . I3» 21 

Moses 24 

Murray, Professor Gilbert 

(Introduction) . . . . xi 

Navies 22 

Nebulae 16, 17 

Nebular Hypothesis * . . 17 

Negation 48 

Nitrogen * 4» 18 

Novelty 9 

Oblivion 43 

Orators 34 



INDEX 



55 



Orion, Nebula in * . . . . 19 
Oxygen * 3, 18 



Palisades (on the Hudson) 11 
Passions of the Cave ... 13 

Peace 21 

Phonograph 12 

Phrynichus (Introduction) xii 
Plague and Famine ... 27 

Power and Pelf 32 

Preachers 35 

Priestley, Dr. Joseph * . . 3 

Railroads 12 

Reincarnation 50 

Ruins 32 

Samaritan, Good . . . .25 

Satellites 5» 18 

Saturn 15, 18 



i * 



15 



Schiaparelli, Giovanni 
Scott, Sir Walter (Intro- 
duction) xii 

Self-sufficiency 46 

Soldiers' Graves 35 

Soul . . . 6, 7, 47, sc 51, 52 

Spirit 31 

Spectroscope 13 

Spencer, Herbert * . . . . 8 
Spiritual Side of Man . . 48 
Stoic Zeal 46 



Stars, Eternal 42 

Stars, Orbit of * 37 

Steamers 24 

Stonehenge * 6 

Structures 29 

Sun 5 

Sun, Death of 41 

Sunset II 

Sun Worship * 6 

Swedenborg, Emanuel * . .17 

Telephones 12 

Ten Commandments ... 24 
Twinkling Stars 29 

Unchangeability of Man . 13 

Universe * 18 

Universe, End of . , . . 45 

Vega* 38 

Venus 14 

Venus, Orbit of * .... 15 

Vice and Virtue 26 

Void 45 

War 22 

World, End of 39 

X-Rays 12 



